Kitchen Addiction & Christmas Wishes: Coming Attractions

By Maryann Yin 

Here are some handpicked titles from our New Books section. Want to include your book? Just read our Facebook Your New or Upcoming Book post. Don’t forget to include your title’s exact release date and a link.

Kitchen Addiction! by Lizz Lund: “Meet Mina Kitchen, a forty-something single who likes to cook – and cook and cook. In fact, her zest for whipping up trays of canapes is dwarfed only by her weird luck and mountain-lion size tabby cat, Vinnie. That, and her godmom’s tendency for blackmailing new members into joining St. Bart’s. Okay, maybe Mina’s Swiffer-addicted neighbor, Vito, is a bit weird, too. As if all that wasn’t enough, Mina’s a Jersey girl transplanted in the midst of the Amish-flavored countryside of Lancaster, PA. Things get really complicated when she learns that her neighbor Vito is in a witness protection program, and her dry cleaner deals in prescription samples. Throw in a few mysterious flaming feces flingers and a fuse box labeled in Arabic, and you have a recipe for catering disorders.” (October 2011)

3 Christmas Wishes by Beth-Ann Mason: “It’s Christmas time and Lacey Jude is not only out of a job, but she and her five-year-old son have also been evicted. When the reverend of her church says he knows of a widower who is willing to let them stay through the holidays, her apprehension is overridden only by the drive to provide a warm and safe place for her son for Christmas. Robert Martinez left the small town as soon as he graduated and hardly looked back. As a founding partner of one of New York’s top advertising firms, he lives his life on his own terms. Going back home brings him face-to-face with a harsh reality; you can rarely have everything your own way. Coming from such different worlds, will Lacey and Robert find a way to make the Christmas wishes of the people they love most come true?” (December 2011)

The Hermetica of Elysium by Ann Marie Banks: “1494 Barcelona. As Torquemada lights the fires of religious fervor throughout the cities of Spain, accused heretics are not the only victims. Thousands of books and manuscripts are lost to the flames as the Black Friars attempt to purge Europe of the ancient secrets of the gods and the bold new ideas that are ushering in the Renaissance. Nadira lives a dreary life as servant to a wealthy spice merchant until the night a dying scholar is brought to the merchant’s stable, beaten by mercenaries who are on the hunt for The Hermetica of Elysium. To Nadira, words are her life: she lives them as her master’s scrivener and dreams them in her mother’s poetry. She is pursued as passionately as the fabled manuscript for her rare skill as a reader of Ancient Greek, Latin, Arabic and Hebrew that makes her valuable to men who pursue the book to exploit its magic. Kidnapped by Baron Montrose, an adventurous nobleman, she is forced to read from the Hermetica. It is soon revealed to her that ideas and words are more powerful than steel or fire for within its pages are the words that incite the Dominicans to religious fervor, give the Templars their power and reveal the lost mysteries of Elysium. As Nadira begins her transformation from servant to sorceress, will she escape the fires of the Inquisition, the clutches of the Borgia pope, Alexander VI and the French king, Charles VIII? And will Montrose’s growing fear of her powers cause her to lose her chance for love?” (December 2011)